Strong Metal, Light Metal - Same Metal!

I love super-science-fictional metals that are actually real metals. Like the new metal is made up of magnesium infused with a dense ceramic silicon carbide nanoparticle made by researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles, Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Sciences

"It's been proposed that nanoparticles could really enhance the strength of metals without damaging their plasticity, especially light metals like magnesium, but no groups have been able to disperse ceramic nanoparticles in molten metals until now," Xiaochun Li, the principal investigator on the research and Raytheon Chair in Manufacturing Engineering at UCLA, said. "With an infusion of physics and materials processing, our method paves a new way to enhance the performance of many different kinds of metals by evenly infusing dense nanoparticles to enhance the performance of metals to meet energy and sustainability challenges in today's society."

This new silicon carbide-infused magnesium demonstrated record levels of specific strength. The specific strength had an astonishing weight-to-durability characteristics. This material can also endure high temperature.

Fans of Edgar Rice Burroughs may recall an ultralight metal called "Harbenite":

Erich von Harben is something of a scientist and explorer himself, and the last time that I saw him he had just returned from a second expedition into the Wiramwazi Mountains, where he told me that he had discovered a lake-dwelling tribe using canoes made of a metal that was apparently as light as cork and stronger than steel. He brought some samples of the metal back with him..."
(Read more about Harbenite)